On Saturday I saw "Spirited Away." The showing was part of the Northampton Independent Film festival (formerly known as the Northampton Film Festival) and before the film began the festival organizer gave a small speech. Basically he was apologizing for showing a film that's being released in the US by Disney (who also recorded the English dubbing for the film), by saying that it still counted as an independent film, dammit; Disney just happened to have bought it after it was independently made. Still, when the credits started rolling and "Walt Disney Pictures Presents" came on screen, the 20-something, black-turtlenecked, never-had-a-real-job-in-their-lives film students in the audience booed and hissed! Listen, hate Disney all you want - there are plenty of good reasons to do so. But when they happen to do something right, why not at least spare the vitriol for once? I hate these pretentious assholes who think everything released by a major studio is, by definition, a crappy movie (not even a "film"). I've seen plenty of independent films that sucked balls, by the way (some of them at this festival, a few years ago). Every once in a while, they get something right and release something with vision and creativity. The studios should be praised for those films, just so they get the idea that it's something they should do more often, instead of releasing another Vin Deisel vehicle or a teenage T&A flick. Or "Analyze That."

Anyway. I loved Spirited Away. I keep thinking about it. I want to see it again, but it's not playing around here. But at least it did play once. At least it was released in this country at all. The voice work was very well done and not distracting. It would have been horrible to have to read subtitles when the visuals were so incredible and full of detail.